Home » Articles and Reviews by 'James Gilmour'
Flappy Birds flaps its last after being removed from the App Store
After its sudden and meteoric rise to success, Flappy Bird has been pulled from the App Store by developer Dong Nguyen. Before fans panic, anyonewho already downloaded the game will still be able to play it. However, any newcomers to find out why Flappy Bird has been stuck at the top of the App Store charts for the past week will now be unable to grab the game for themselves. Though creator Nguyen hasn't given a precise reason as to why he chose to pull the game, it seems that he was having difficulty dealing with the unexpected shift from quiet indie dev to internet celebrity. On Saturday, he posted the following statement on his Twitter feed: "I am sorry 'Flappy Bird' users, 22 hours f…
Dungeon Keeper: What did you expect?
There has been a lot written about the mobile version of Dungeon Keeper over the past week. There have been tantrums. There have been tears. There have been 1-star reviews. There has even been a scandal relating to the app's rating system which calls the business practises of EA and Mythic Entertainment into question. The thing is, it was always going to be this way. Dungeon Keeper 2014 was never going to be the game you wanted. Why? Let me explain:…
Kairosoft's Ninja Village stealthily appears out of nowhere for iPhone and iPad
After almost a year on Android devices, Kairosoft's Ninja Village finally reached the App Store yesterday. As you might expect, it’s quite different from Kairosoft’s most successful game, Game Dev Story, in that it has more ninjas. As the leader of a ninja clan, you must train and gear up your recruits to fight other armies, with the intention of unifying all of Japan. Most of your time will be spent managing your village and taking on battles. Oh, and taking part in the age-old Japanese tradition of recruiting ninja animals. To improve your infantry, archers, gunners, and cavalry, you’ll need money. This means starting up businesses to get the cash flowing in, and…
Darkly comic PC hit Surgeon Simulator coming to iPad 'soon'
Get ready to don your surgical gown and anaesthetise the morality centre of your brain: Macabre medical game Surgeon Simulator is officially coming to the App Store. Bossa Studios, the developer behind the sadistically humorous Surgeon Simulator 2013 has been toying around with the idea of porting a version of the game to iPad since last year. Speaking to sister site Pocket Gamer in 2013, developer Tom Jackson said that the team had been working in a new control system to allow players to slice and dice efficiently on touchscreen devices. It looks like they must have cracked it, as Bossa Studios has just posted a teaser trailer (above) confirming that Surgeon Simulator is "coming s…
Fluid-puzzler Feed Me Oil 2 gets 15 new levels in latest update
Gooey liquid-based puzzler Feed Me Oil 2 has just been updated with 15 new levels. Players who download the game's first free content update will unlock the previously inaccessible fifth island. Provided you've collected the 170 stars required to gain entry, you'll be able to explore the island and tackle a brand new batch of fluid-centric conundrums. Also, according to developer Holy Water Games, you can now share your high scores via Facebook if you want. Just bear in mind that most of your friends will probably hate you for it if you do. We thought Feed Me Oil 2 was an agreeably slick package, calling it "another tight and satisfying puzzle experience" in our review. You can dow…
Apple ordered to refund $32.5 million to parents over in-app purchase policy
Apple has agreed to pay no less than $32.5 million in refunds to parents who were billed after their children made in-app purchases on the App Store without their consent. The original class action lawsuit, which saw parents seeking compensation after claiming that Apple's in-app purchase policy failed to prevent their kids from making unauthorized purchases, was actually settled by a US judge last year. However, it turns out that the promise of a $5 iTunes voucher for each affected customer (or up to $30 cash) wasn't enough for the Federal Trade Commission. By failing to alert parents to the 15 minute window of additional purchases their kids could make after entering a password, the Cup…
Strike from the shadows in impressive new ninja platformer Shadow Blade
Slick ninja platformer Shadow Blade has just sprung from the shadows of the App Store to deal a killing blow to your spare time. Nailing platforming mechanics on touchscreen devices is a tricky feat, one which many fail to accomplish. For every decent mobile platformer like League of Evil, there's an army of Duke Nukem: Manhattan Projects waiting in the wings. However, after a quick hands-on, we can report that the newly-released Shadow Blade from developer Dead Mage appears to be one of the good ones. Taking control of a wall-leaping, sword-swinging ninja, you have to run, jump, and swipe your way through a series of treacherous environments and enemies. There are goons at every…
Episode 2 of Telltale's The Wolf Among Us skulking onto the App Store in early February
Telltale Games has announced that the second episode of The Wolf Among Us will stalk onto the App Store during the first week of February. Given the excitement triggered by the return zombie saga The Walking Dead - and the hype surrounding the recently announced Game of Thrones interactive series - you'd be forgiven for thinking that Telltale had forgotten all about its fantasy comic book adaptation The Wolf Among Us. Since the first episode launched on iOS in early December of last year, we haven't heard hide nor hair from lupine detective Bigby Wolf, or the other fairytale inhabitants of Fabletown. Thankfully for fans of the first chapter, a post on Telltale's forum has confir…
Avoid alien invasion by a whisker in tower-defence shooter Naughty Kitties
Naughty Kitties is the inevitable result of a culture obsessed with paranoid invasion fantasies and pictures of cute cats. You've got your basic Independence Day-style alien invasion setup: extra-terrestrials are descending from space with the intention of using your entire planet as an interstellar conservatory. The only way to stop this from happening is to launch a fish-shaped ship to meet this invaders headfirst, and make sure you and your fellow cats keep the craft flying and firing until the alien menace is defeated. Oh yes - you're a cat, by the way. See: The latest free-to-play game from Coconut Island, Naughty Kitties is part shooter, part tower defence game. The game involves…
Massive isometric RPG Avadon 2: The Corruption infecting iPads on February 28th
If you're the kind of gamer who likes their RPGs isometric and covered in grids, then we've got some good news for you. Spiderweb Software has revealed that its massive RPG follow-up Avadon 2: The Corruption will be coming to iPad on February 28th. As you might expect, the sequel to Avadon HD is rammed full of geometric dungeons, ye-olde weaponry, magic systems, and textures that look like they've been lifted out of an Amiga game from 1992. Story-wise, you'll be assuming the role of a servant of the Black Fortress charged with sorting out the civil war that's been making Avadon such an off-putting holiday destination. If it's anything like the first game, Avadon 2: The Corruption…
Battle Supremacy Review
Atypical Games and Revo Studios are probably best known for the historically-slanted Sky Gamblers flight sim series. For their latest foray into our recent and violent past, the developers have decided to try their hands at tank-based warfare in the WWII blaster Battle Supremacy. And, though it's not as deep or uncompromising as a full-blown tank sim, the game occupies arcade-shooter territory with a respectable degree of confidence. The campaign sees you trundling across France, Russ…
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Be attracted - or repulsed - by the brutal mazes of Magnetized
You know that bit in the first Batman movie when the Batman fires a grappling hook from the side of the Batmobile so that hooks around a vertical girder, thereby allowing the vehicle to zoom around a corner at full speed? Well, imagine the Batmobile is a black block, and the grappling hook is a visible strand of pure magnetism. Are you doing it? If you are, then you should have a pretty good idea how Macca Cloud's new maze-based puzzler Magnetized works. Each level begins with the hero block flying straight down a neon corridor. There are magnetic blocks dotted around the 80 mazes, each of which can be triggered by holding your finger to the screen. You can only activate one magne…
Ingenious line-drawing puzzler Blek now available on iPhone
It's a good time to be a puzzle fan with an iPhone. Not only can you tackle the ingenious line-based conundrums of the recently released - and rather excellent - LYNE, and the liquid delights of fluid puzzer Feel Me Oil 2, you can finally try Blek. The iPad crowd has had exclusive bragging rights over this nifty gesture-powered join-the-dots puzzle game for a few weeks now. You've seen them: eliminating coloured blobs by flicking their smug fingers across their oversized tablet devices, occasionally shooting you and your petite iPhone pitying glances while baring their polished teeth through barely-contained sneers. But no more. No more must you tolerate their self-satisfied condesce…
See the gross miracle of birth in first Mewgenics footage
Team Meat has just given us the first glimpse of its upcoming cat breeding sim Mewgenics in action, via an animated GIF posted on its blog. And, as you might expect from the creators of Super Meat Boy, the footage is a bit weird. Though the GIF (below) only runs a few seconds long, it show a female cat giving birth to two kittens, while the daddy cat looks on expectantly. As Team Meat co-founder Edmund explains, the footage demonstrates the way in which kittens inherit physical traits from both their parents. For example, the first kitten delivered possesses the spotted body markings of its mother, but the head shape of its father. What the GIF doesn't reveal is that…
Joe Danger Infinity Review
Joe Danger was one of those games that leapt effortlessly from the console realm, and managed to land perfectly on the mobile platform. The sequel, Joe Danger Infinity, reminds us precisely why we loved the first game, and gives us a generous selection of meticulously designed levels, colourful characters, and new vehicles to discover. Rather than assuming control of Joe himself, the sequel has you taking charge of a Joe Danger action figure. Given his diminutive proportions, the full…
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